Degas, Edgar

Woman Combing her Hair

c.1887-90; Louvre, Paris

Degas, in the Classic line of descent from
Ingres
as a draughtsman--and one of the greatest in Europe since the giants of the
Renaissance--exchanged
oil paint for pastel, as in this example, with
a sense of greater freedom in being able to draw in the medium as well
as to apply color. The word `classic' refers to his preoccupation with
the human figure but not to any desire to depict an ideal type of
humanity. Remarking that `la femme en général est laide' he showed
no disposition to modify this supposed ugliness. He quickly abandoned
the antique subject-matter of pictorial composition after his few early
essays.

His meeting with
Manet
in 1862, his acquaintance with
Berthe Morisot,
Monet,
Renoir and
Pissarro
and his introduction to the
Impressionist dealer Durand-Ruel,
all tended to draw him into the current of
Realism and Impressionism,
though open-air landscape painting did not interest him in the least.
Realism required that the nude should be depicted in a situation
of credible reality and not artificially posed as some character of
fable. Impressionism no doubt contributed the idea that just as the
landscape painter caught transient effects of light so it was possible
to catch natural and transient phases of movement in the living model.
The credible reality was usually that of bathers in the open.
Degas made a logical enlargement of his field of study in depicting
women in various stages of undress at their toilet or getting into
and out of le tub.
With its unconventional pose, this pastel shows the concentrated force
of form and color he was able to attain.